This August, he'll open a restaurant in Memphis, Tennessee where everything costs under $5, he tells Tech Insider. Called The Kitchenette, the grab-and-go restaurant will serve mainly sandwiches, soups, and salads.

The first Kitchenette location will live in the visitor's center at Shelby Farms Park, a 4,500-acre urban park and conservancy. Inside, The Kitchenette will look similar to a coffee shop, with a counter and a few tables. After people grab their grub, they can eat it on the patio or the Park's giant lawn in front.

Musk hopes to launch more locations within Memphis and eventually nationwide, though there are no firm plans yet.

A rendering of The Kitchenette's porch at Shelby Farms Park. Courtesy of Kimbal Musk

Before Musk worked in food, he worked in Silicon Valley with Elon. In 1995, the two brothers started their first tech company, a Google Maps-esque service called Zip2. After selling it for around $300 million. They then invested in a new venture, which later became PayPal, but Kimbal decided to leave the tech industry for culinary school.

Many of the skills he learned working in Silicon Valley — mainly the willingness to take risks and think decades into the future — helped him launch restaurants aimed at helping Americans eat more healthier, more sustainable food.

Musk's larger mission is to strengthen people's connection to local food and each other, or create what he calls a "real food culture."

"In the past five years, we've moved toward eating in our cars, our cubicles, and in front of our TVs. It's very isolating," he says. "The reality is that we connect through food, and we have the opportunity to do it three times a day.

Normal fast food is full of calories and low of nutritional value, he says. "People are overweight and starving at the same time," he says. "It's a tragedy for both the individual and society."

His place will be different. Musk and The Kitchenette staff plan to work with local farmers and offer food made only with organic ingredients.

Chefs at The Kitchen Chicago plate mussels and pork. Courtesy of Kimbal Musk

The Kitchenette is just one of many restaurant concepts from Musk and co-founder Hugo Matheson, who also run two chains of farm-to-table restaurants, called The Kitchen and Next Door. The restaurants have eight locations in total in Denver, Boulder, Chicago, and Memphis. The former serves more gourmet food than the latter.

The restaurants are built near farms where the staff sources produce. Describing them as "neighborhood hangouts," Musk says five additional Kitchens and Next Doors will open over the next year.

While the Kitchenette's pricing sounds too good to be true, Musk says he will make it work with a little help from local farmers. The same farms distribute meat and produce to all three of restaurant concepts, and knock down the price based on what's in-season.

A customer at The Kitchen Chicago eats beet salad with chicken. Courtesy of Kimbal Musk

In 2011, Musk also launched a nonprofit program, called Learning Gardens, in 300 schools across the US. Part-playground, part-outdoor classroom, the gardens help kids learn that fruits and veggies can taste great, Musk says. He's talking with hundreds of other schools to build more.

"The idea is to get them engaged in real food," he says.

The Learning Gardens are in the same four cities as The Kitchen and Next Door locations, plus Los Angeles. The restaurants also gather food made from the Gardens and incorporate it in their menus.

A Learning Garden. Courtesy of Kimbal Musk

Musk is focusing on launching the restaurants and Learning Gardens in one city at a time. He believes that this approach, as opposed to scattering them throughout the country, will create a more lasting impact on individual communities since the schools work hand-in-hand with the restaurants. Centering the projects in cities also lets the restaurant teams develop deeper, more meaningful relationships with local farmers.

And once customers taste The Kitchenette's food, he's certain the restaurant will flourish.

"People want real food," he says. "The demand for it is through the roof."